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CHAPTER XI. 



NOVEMBER. 



The year, with all its varied pleasures, joys and 

 sorrows, sunshine and clouds, storm and calm, is draw- 

 ing to a close; day succeeding day, week to week, 

 month to month, in the onward course of time. We 

 have almost arrived at that period when we cease (most 

 of us) to derive pleasure from the contemplation of 

 nature ; we associate with the idea of winter an almost 

 total cessation of animal and vegetable life, and con- 

 sider it a dreary and unsatisfactory period —the death 

 of the year — but is such really the case ? are the winter 

 months such a " tabula rasa," such a blank as some 

 would fain make us believe. I think not : 'tis true the 

 oak, the ash and the elm no longer exhibit to us their 

 dense masses of foliage, and on the slender twigs of 

 the birch the beautiful leaves have ceased to vibrate, 

 glancing and sparkling in the sunlight ; and the gaunt 

 figure of the poplar, as he stands denuded of his leafy 

 honours, looms heavily in the murky air. 



The active and pugnacious redbreast has left the 

 woods to pay his annual visit to the dwellings of man ; 

 the sprightly chiff-chaff, the black-cap and nightingale, 

 have taken their departure for southern lands and 

 sunny skies ; while the bare hedge-rows expose to view 

 the now-deserted nests, within whose mossy depths 



